The Florida real estate agent explains how she transformed her Palm Beach house into a colorful and casual open-air oasis and how her mother, the late Lilly Pulitzer, inspired her design style.

Liza Pulitzer Calhoun: Yes! We thought, Why not? Five years ago, my husband, Bob, and I bought this property with two small 1920s houses on it. We built an outdoor living room to connect the cottages and then turned the main house's living room into our dining room.

It's a little unusual to walk through the front door and into a dining room.

People said, 'Liza, you're a real estate agent! You know you can't do that!' But I love it. At parties you walk in to a million twinkling candles on the dining room table, then before you know it, you're in the kitchen, and then you're outside again! We use breezeways and covered outdoor paths to get back to the second house, where we have a bar, a family room, and some guest rooms. We're always outdoors.

More From House Beautiful

Even in hurricane season?

Yes. We've even had monsoons! But the deep overhangs of the roof keep us dry. And this loggia is really wide. Most people make them too narrow; you need at least 12 to 14 feet of width if you want to use a loggia as a proper living room — with two sofas, two armchairs, and, ideally, a fireplace. Our fireplace was Bob's brilliant idea. It's made from stones and shells I've collected all over the world — Kilimanjaro, Mongolia, Scotland, and the Palm Beach inlet. Almost every night, we light a fire, pull up some chairs, and put our feet up on the hearth.

How did you create calm from such a bold mash-up of colors?

A good friend of mine, designer Judy Kling, was my sounding board, and, of course, my mother was a big inspiration.

Not surprising, since your mother, Lilly Pulitzer, is a legendary icon of both Palm Beach and the fashion world.

Yes, and as you can imagine, Mom made me fearless. Everything was color on color on color at our house, and I loved it! For my mother, it was all about florals, but I like fabrics that are more primitive — African, Indian, and ethnic prints — like the ikat on the kitchen sofa and my bedroom's Indian duvet. Color and pattern hide stains, so I don't care if my dogs jump up on the furniture or if a friend's child is eating peanut butter and jelly on my sofa. And color feels so offhand and casual. Mom entertained constantly, but it was always 'No jacket, no tie, no shoes required.' Just like me.

What else did you learn at Lilly's knee?

My mother loved large scale — everything had to be bigger than life! See my huge dining room table? There's nothing formal about it, and it grounds the strong mustard-gold walls. At cocktail parties, we've had 10 people sitting on that coffee table in the living room. I think large, primitive furniture makes bright color feel less fussy. My end tables are always oversize, and my kitchen island is 12 feet long. When we renovated the kitchen, we removed the original ceiling and recycled some of the wood for the island. It's so durable, we chop directly on it, and for dinner parties we just yank the stools away and serve buffet-style right from the island.

And your guests can line up on this lovely chocolate-brown striped floor.

My sister, Minnie McCluskey, and a friend painted all the floors and walls in the house, and also faux-painted a cypress ceiling and paneling in the bar area. The stripes in the kitchen and the diamonds on the dining room floor were all done freehand, no tape measure. They're not perfect, but I don't do perfection. If it's perfect, where's the fun?

I'm sorry, but this daybed swing on your back patio actually is perfection.

It reminds me of our family summers in the Adirondacks. We had daybed swings made of canvas and horsehair, and I wanted to bring that look south. The cushion is simply covered with a tablecloth, and I threw some random pillows on it. I don't care if it all matches. I think fearlessness runs in the family. In the late '60s, my grandmother Lillian Phipps had brown lacquered walls with pink sofas.

Sitting here on your living room sofa, I'm getting more and more comfortable with purple.

For me, this eggplant color is a neutral. It goes so well with green, and all my pool towels are lime green. But I also have a big love for red, the way the tomato-soup red walls in the kitchen glow at night. In fact, I like a little bit of red in every room. There are red lanterns in the powder room, and Chinese-red lampshades in the dining room. I think a pop of red is a little bit of heaven.

Would you call this place Liza Pulitzer's interpretation of Lilly Pulitzer style?

Actually, it's a mix. When we were kids, we spent a lot of time on Dad's boat in the Bahamas — fishing and diving, going from island to island. It's a big part of me. That's why we have the pitched roofs, the louvers, the ceiling fans, and painted wood floors everywhere. They have that breezy, barefoot, island feeling I adore. And these huge images of waves and water and fish by my photographer son Christopher Leidy transport me to the islands every day.